Tuesday, 28 April 2015

Valedor (Book Review)

aledor is a surprise success more than anything else. To me personally, this was most certainly not a good combination. It tied together the utterly atrocious lore of Codex: Iyanden with a writer who seemed to both avidly stick with the most current lore no matter how well it fitted the army, and whose previous effort was considerably less than stellar. However, while he certainly has his problems when it comes to astartes, it seems that Guy Haley has a serious talent when it comes to depicting the Craftworld Eldar in all their inhumanity.The war to save Iyanden is over. While many of its populace lie dead, its towers ruined and Yriel having all but sold his soul to ensure victory, it still stands. There is now time for rebuilding, yet the bedraggled warhost soon finds that their campaign against the Tyranid Hive Fleets are not yet done. On the world of Valedor there will be a meeting. The remaining forces of Kraken are soon to meet with a newly arrived splinter of Hive Fleet Leviathan, and should they be allowed to join information on countless races within the galaxy will be known. Should the Tyranids merge, a power beyond reckoning will stride forth and bathe the galaxy in blood. Unable to stop this threat alone, Iyanden’s ruling elite petition the assistance of their former ally Biel-Tan and even their dark kin to halt this joining. Should they fail, then the galaxy itself will be utterly doomed…

2 comments:

Not to belittle the threat of the Tyranids, but isn't this kind of a pointless sacrifice for the Eldar to make, at least from the premise? Or are they just unaware of the nature of the Tyranids?

"The remaining forces of Kraken are soon to meet with a newly arrived splinter of Hive Fleet Leviathan, and should they be allowed to join information on countless races within the galaxy will be known."But the Tyranid Codex's have shown that the Hive Mind does not need the various fleets to meet to exchange information as that would mean there isn't only one Hive Mind, there'd be many unique to their various fleets. When Hive Fleet Gorgon was destroyed by the Tau it's mentioned that it was a pointless act as the Hive Mind retained all information gained from the fleet. Considering the losses the Eldar already suffered it doesn't make sense to me to have them take on the Tyranids themselves (as opposed to manipulating others to do it for them) UNLESS they are unaware of this fact.

... Well damn it, that's even the main premise of this book screwed up. They honestly did emphasise that it was bio-information being carried over rather than raw matter or anything else, and nothing was added to suggest they were wrong. The only thing I can guess is that they were working off of the old idea of Tyranid Hive Fleets fighting and consuming one another, with the victor emerging stronger, but even that doesn't quite work.Damn, the one aspect they actually carried over from Codex: Iyanden and it's still wrong. Did that book get nothing right!?